IN reply to Hylton Miles's enquiry about the maiden name of Samuel Jenkins' wife Mary I have researched that Samuel married Mary, who was from Bitton on the outskirts of Bristol, at St. Mary le Port on February 28, 1837 and her maiden name was Lansdown.
Samuel was from Bream and a coalminer by trade. Bitton was adjacent to Kingswood, which encompassed the northern end of the Bristol and North Somerset coalfield; including Easton, Coalpit Heath and Yate. The coalfield had pits similar to those of the Forest of Dean and worked from the late 17th Century until the the 1950s. It can only be assumed that Samuel may have been working in or had some direct connection with one of those pits and there met his future bride.
According to the 1861 Census, Samuel and Mary were living at 43, The Dark Hole, Bream (romantic lot, we Vurristers) and he was still working as a coalminer. They had seven children, from the age of 18 down to two. Simeon, Seoi, Rush, Caleb, Elizabeth, John and Jane. Agnes, the eighth and youngest, was born in 1866.
By 1881, Samuel had moved up in the world and now described himself as a 'Coal Owner' and he, Mary and young Alice lived on Mill Hill, Bream. In 1891, the year of his death, Samuel was a local preacher (Non-Comformist I should imagine) thus ensuring his place in heaven, in spite of his un-Christian money lending methods.
It appears that after Samuel's death, Mary moved back to the Bitton area with the 11d a week (less than a shilling) given her by her children to keep her going and lived with her grandson, Wallace, until her own death in 1911.
I believe this answers Hylton's question and although family history research is full of pitfalls, especially with common surnames, I think this is the true record. – John Belcher, volunteer researcher, Dean Heritage Museum.